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An Agent-Based Simulation For Emergency Response Management

Timothy Schoenharl, R. Ryan McCune, Greg Madey

of the University of Notre Dame du Lac

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. CNS-0540348

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Wireless Phone-based Emergency Response System

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Purpose of Simulation Limited knowledge

of events by emergency managers

Understand crisis development

Develop strategy for better response

http://www.nyc.gov/html/fdny/gif/photo_unit/fires/122602/122602_157_truck.jpg

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Overview of Simulation Agent-based simulations model

behavior of city’s population Simulate normal and crisis behavior Output call activity and agent location

on GIS map

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Implementation RePast 3.1 for Java

Colt High Performance Scientific Library

Geotools OpenMap

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Implementation Pattern Oriented Design Singleton Class

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The Agent Each agent represents pedestrian Randomly assigned initial position

inside of Voronoi Cell Call activity based on empirical

distributions Movement determined by given

scenario

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The Environment

Real city created with GIS files Cell phone tower

locations Roads, Water, Political Boundaries

Voronoi cells built around cell phone towers

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Simulation Scenarios Simulate Regular behavior

Move and return Location and call activity based on empirical data

Crisis behavior Flee – Run from a point Bounded Flee – Run a distance from a point

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Validation Movement Model

Face Value Call Activity

Empirical vs. Simulated results plotted

Kolmogorov-Smirnov test

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Validation cont.

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Interface RePast GUI OpenMap Display Voronoi cell color changes with agent

containment Call Activity Graph

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Screenshot of Repast GUI

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Runtime Performance Runtime vs. Graphical Output

500 Agents Move and Return Model Distribution-Based Calling Activity

GIS Agent Location Snapshot Time (s)

No No No 240

Yes No No 354

Yes Yes No 363

Yes Yes Yes 35200

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Runtime Performance Runtime vs. Number of Agents

Linear Scaling demonstrates excellent runtime characteristics

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Summary Agent-based model to simulate crisis

behavior Movement dependent on behavior

model and outputted to GIS map Calling Activity based on empirical data Designed for WIPER System

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Future Work Implement more crisis scenarios Study of aggregate patterns More realistic agent paths

Road and Highway use Vary Speed Traffic Jam Scenarios

Water Social network structure

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Questions?